SOARING house prices have put paid to the ambitions of thousands of young people to get a first foot on the property ladder.

Latest figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) show that only 30,000 first-time buyers entered the market last month, compared with 48,000 in June last year. “Despite very affordable mortgage rates, high prices are making it difficult for first-time buyers,” says CML director general Michael Coogan.

Last month’s first-time entrants accounted for only 29 per cent of all mortgage borrowers, compared with a long-run trend of more than 45 per cent. This suggests that first-timers’ confidence may be lower than other buyers, and that affordability constraints are likely to affect them to a greater extent.

But it’s not all doom and gloom for young people wanting their own home. A new report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation says that young earners in the north west find it easier to set foot on the home ownership ladder than in most other parts of England.

By comparing average local incomes for earners in their 20s and 30s with the typical prices of a less expensive starter home, the analysis shows that around 25 per cent of young working households across the region would have difficulty affording a modest starter home. This compares with almost 50 per cent nationally.

In Manchester, starter-home prices are beyond the reach of fewer than one in four young working households, compared with more than three out of four across inner London.

The new study also shows that, unlike the south of England, starter-home prices in most north western officer or social worker with three years’ experience, would find the bottom 25 per cent of the price range for modest four and fiveroom homes well within their reach.

Chester, Macclesfield, Stockport, and Trafford are among the few districts where a single nurse’s income is less than 100 per cent of the estimated level needed to start buying with a mortgage. But even in these areas a qualified teacher with three years’ experience should be able to afford a mortgage on a less expensive starter home.

The Rowntree report, by Professor Steve Wilcox of the University of York, presents three different “affordability” indices comparing younger workers’ earnings with house prices for four and five-room homes in every English borough and district. They cover;

Local house price to income ratios, calculated by comparing the average price for starter homes in each district with average local incomes for working households under 40.

An access to ownership index that calculates the percentage of working households under 40 in each district whose pay is too low to purchase even the less expensive starter homes.

A key worker index, identifying areas where a qualified nurse, teacher, social worker or police constable in post for three or four years would be unable to afford the less expensive starter homes.

Prof. Wilcox said: “Starter homes in the north west are generally much more affordable than those in London and the south east, yet there are still five districts where a third or more of young working households cannot afford their first step into home ownership.

“House prices are much lower than in the south of England, but the affordability gap tends to narrow once differences in the level of local pay and incomes are taken into account.

“The good news in most north western districts is that their individual incomes are adequate or very close to the level needed to raise a mortgage on a modest starter home.”